Adding a couple satelite images of sub tropical coastal waters:
The old river/sea bed patterning was considerably more realistic as well as aesthetically appealing. I also think that the depth of sand on beaches, in deserts, and under river transitions is less than it should be.
100% agreed. Some days ago, I made a similar thing ...
Btw, does anyone else here think that leaves are too dark now?
[]http://i54.tinypic.com/11vmruu.png[]
I like having the darker foliage in some biomes. The loss of tropical forest removed the vibrant green trees, so all we have are the darker ones. In general, before we had tree variety at all, I considered the trees a bit too "radio active" green. The grass had the same problem. It was so unrealistically vibrant it was kind of obnoxious. If we got the tropical forest back we'd see some of that vibrant color return.
I know that Notch or Jeb commented recently on the order of precedence for the secondary terrain features (ravines, mineshafts, stronghold, villages) and admitted that strongholds need to take a higher priority in the rendering to prevent things just such as that.
I didn't get the impression that the means of achieving the outcome was quite what it ought to be though. It was intended to be along the lines of dissalowing mineshaft components from floating in ravines or replacing existing stronghold blocks.
I kind of think all of it could use some tweaking, to an extent.
Ravines don't feel exciting. They're too common and not big enough. I'd vote they make them their own biome, but more rare, kind of like Shroom-biome is. Then make them larger/wider and exciting to explore, build in/on, etc. A 2-4 block wide tear in the ground just becomes something for me to run around. A 10-15 block wide (or larger) gaping ravine becomes a neat feature.
I suspect the ravines have much the same problem that the rest of the 1.8/1.9 terrain generator has, and that is very little variation within a given biome or type of terrain feature. I don't think ravines need to be a biome to give us their full potential, they can remain a secondary terrain feature. There just needs to be more variance in their depth and width to allow both a small creek at the bottom of a canal, and Grand Canyon like outcomes, as well as ravines that looked more like a cliff (one side shallow, the other steep). If the biomes were changed to have a deeper impact on the geology, we could see ravines that had stone sides, as well as earthen and sandstone.
Tree-less mountains is pretty much a bummer. They either need to be SO high they're snowy on top, or they need trees again. I basically have to import trees to make my mountain areas less dull right now. Plus the trees stopped the creepers from just falling on your head (lol).
The current "Extreme Hills" biome does seem entirely undesired. It takes the place of what could be a true mountain, rocks and snow above the trees and clouds, while leaving us with no expectation for hills in our forests and deserts.
Deserts can seem really boring too. Need sand/sandstone? .. strip-mine the desert. Otherwise, its just a flat area that is easy to Sprint through to get to something better.
I'll admit that I rarely go into the Desert except to collect sand and a couple cactus. Some unique mobs like giant scorpions, or if cactus only produced flowers in a Desert biome, and they had desireable properties for potions or whatever would give us some more reasons to want to go there.
What I'd like to see (the shipwreck idea set it off in me) is a lot more neat random "features" or "places of interest" that can appear in biomes. Shipwrecks in the ocean would be neat. Wreckage on the beaches would be awesome too. Throw a zombie spawner and a chest in it and it becomes a neat place to explore, or take apart if you need/want wood.
What about cemeteries that can pop up in land biomes? Either "modern" ones with headstones and crypts to explore, or older burial-mount style places?
Pyramids or ruins in sand areas to explore?
The ruins of old buildings in places? Like an old wood shack that is all half-caved in.
Little rarities like that could make more ho-hum biomes seem more alive, and just by reusing current things in game (current monsters, current blocks) to create "places of interest". Things to make the world feel more exciting to explore and less empty. Strongholds and mineshaft areas are a good start, I'd like to see more, though.
I certainly like the idea of having a shipwreck with a zombie spawner in it to give it a "haunted shipwreck" feel (I think zombies can drown for some reason, that would need to change). In general, having more places of interest, like the new villages, is certainly a good addition to the secondary features of the terrain generator. As the bigger issues are finalised, these later addons to the terrain will become more numerous and varied I hope.
While it is true that hunger changed the system, you still need to eat food in order to regain health, the mechanic remained the same, it merely got refined.
And it is true that it could change, it is also true that a clown could jump out of your closet and smack you with a giant hammer, but I doubt you are constantly checking, because you know as well as I do that it isn't going to happen
"Refinement" would imply that the basic format for the equation remained the same, and the values of the variables were changed. That is NOT what happened. The fundemental mechanics behind how the resource was managed changed, from [food in = health increase] to [if food > X then periodic health increase].
The situation would be no different for skills. It is entirely possible, and even likely, that the mechanics we have become accustomed to will not be the default values or states for those abilities if a skill based system were implemented. The level of capability we have been accustomed to could be set as the values achieved when "maxed out."
... you can still play minecraft the same way you have for the past year
That is still an optimistic assumption about the potential impact for a skill system, not a fact.
That is very poor reasoning, since there is no way in hell a skill system would change a games basic mechanics.
You presume too much. The new Hunger system changed the way food and health work very much. If skills were introduced there is no reason to think that the player characters' abilities to do such simple things as harvest raw materials could not change dramatically. To think it impossible or even unlikely would be naive.
... you can still play minecraft the same way you have for the past year
You can't know that to be true. It is entirely possible that the mechanics we have become accustomed to will not be the default values or states for those abilities if a skill based system were implemented. The level of capability we have been accustomed to could be set as the values achieved when "maxed out."
Seriously, nobody thinks the thousands of oasis and cacti in the desert looks bad?
While I don't think all arid terrain should be full of cacti, there are some arid regions that areveryverdant.
That's why I would support breaking the current single Desert biome into three arid biomes, as I detail in a post on the second page of this thread. The Dunes biome is the classic cliche type of arid biome that would perhaps appeal more to you. I think it reasonable to split the arid and wetland biomes up more than they are currently to match the diversity of our arboreal biomes.
I'm finding that snow biomes, mountain biomes, and deserts are rather dull and bare because they lack natural props.
Forests have tons of trees, which makes the landscape less plain, and even grasslands have nice tall grass coverage. But snow, mountain, and desert biomes have so many completely flat featureless surfaces because they don't even have decent grass or tree coverage.
For grassland or similar terrain under snow as well as the sand dunes type of arid biome, I think a fairly featureless landscape is expected. Having lived many years in the Great Plains, I can tell you the landscape looks quite flat and featureless under a foot of snow. The problem is really that there is only one type of arid biome, and only one redundant biome (Plains+snow=Snow biome) with snow.
I do agree that some biomes could use more secondary foliage or more varied surface geology. With an improved weather system, adding snow onto them would change their character significantly, and help increase the perception of more varied terrain types.
Snow biomes could really use thick snow block layers around too, and maybe odd ice and snow block formations as well.
For a better Mountain biome, or an improved Snow biome, I think adding a layer of snow blocks would be a great addition. Not just the little layer of snow (although that could remain) but a nice layer of blocks, especially in the low areas like valleys and clefts of those terrain types.
For the people choosing Mountain/Extreme Hills as the biome most in need of changes, what is it about them that makes them such a priority?
Would it be their lack of snow covered rocky peaks, not appealing to an epic "mountain feel"? Perhaps the new generic appearance lacking trees and always being grassy, which comes from all other biomes seemingly losing topographical variation? I know I have seen a thread or two regarding a dislike of the supposed increase in their fantastic/flying appearance. Is it that they simply aren't or can't be tall enough to achieve a proper mountain look or scale?
The torrent of redundant pre4 related threads seems to have buried this. There are still a lot of concerns being voiced about the terrain and map generation.
Honestly, I don't understand why people are so set in their ideas that this is a game breaking feature. All this lets you do is move the spawner. I can make the slaughter house at the spawner's original resting place, or I can put it in underneath my colossal underground base. Just a thing of convenience.
Exactly. None of the functional mechanics have changed. It's just a matter of convenience as to where the thing is. I hope it stays.
I personally don't think the current Mountain/"Extreme Hills" biome is at all mountainous in the stereotypical sense that most people expect when they think of "mountains." The expectation being extremely tall rugged rocky peaks, perhaps covered in snow or "so tall it's above the clouds," or so tall it has a tree-line. Part of that being because of the way the map is generated and the very limited Y axis not providing sufficient space for such things to exist.
As I've been forced to point out elsewhere, mountains in the general sense of tall geographical formations exist in every type of biome. Mountain is not a biome except in the extreme case of altitudes above which trees do not grow, otherwise they can be found hot or cold, wet or arid (Aird/Desert mts: one example the Great Basin Desert including the Grand Canyon, and much of the southwest US including the portions of the Rockies).
Silk touch is a very high level enchantment for pickaxes
using silk touch you are able to mine RAW ore
EX: mining coal with a NORMAL pickaxe gives you... COAL
EX: mining coal with a SILK TOUCH pickaxe gives you... COAL BLOCK as in a placable COAL BLOCK
which you can mine again or use as decoration.
Awesome, now I have a use for all that Redstone. I can finally build with it instead of filling piles of double chests with powder I don't want.
It would be nice if the graphic didn't change to a pig (I assume its just the miniature, not the spawn effect changing). It has always seemed odd to have spawners exist but make them immutable - the only thing close to that was bedrock (and the new End portal) which actually had a reason to be that way. In that past Iv'e ignored them, because I didn't want to wander all over the place just to get to spawners, but if I can place them where I'd prefer once found, they're far more useful now.
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The old river/sea bed patterning was considerably more realistic as well as aesthetically appealing. I also think that the depth of sand on beaches, in deserts, and under river transitions is less than it should be.
I like having the darker foliage in some biomes. The loss of tropical forest removed the vibrant green trees, so all we have are the darker ones. In general, before we had tree variety at all, I considered the trees a bit too "radio active" green. The grass had the same problem. It was so unrealistically vibrant it was kind of obnoxious. If we got the tropical forest back we'd see some of that vibrant color return.
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Nice illustration of the ideas. :biggrin.gif:
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I know that Notch or Jeb commented recently on the order of precedence for the secondary terrain features (ravines, mineshafts, stronghold, villages) and admitted that strongholds need to take a higher priority in the rendering to prevent things just such as that.
I didn't get the impression that the means of achieving the outcome was quite what it ought to be though. It was intended to be along the lines of dissalowing mineshaft components from floating in ravines or replacing existing stronghold blocks.
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I suspect the ravines have much the same problem that the rest of the 1.8/1.9 terrain generator has, and that is very little variation within a given biome or type of terrain feature. I don't think ravines need to be a biome to give us their full potential, they can remain a secondary terrain feature. There just needs to be more variance in their depth and width to allow both a small creek at the bottom of a canal, and Grand Canyon like outcomes, as well as ravines that looked more like a cliff (one side shallow, the other steep). If the biomes were changed to have a deeper impact on the geology, we could see ravines that had stone sides, as well as earthen and sandstone.
The current "Extreme Hills" biome does seem entirely undesired. It takes the place of what could be a true mountain, rocks and snow above the trees and clouds, while leaving us with no expectation for hills in our forests and deserts.
I'll admit that I rarely go into the Desert except to collect sand and a couple cactus. Some unique mobs like giant scorpions, or if cactus only produced flowers in a Desert biome, and they had desireable properties for potions or whatever would give us some more reasons to want to go there.
I certainly like the idea of having a shipwreck with a zombie spawner in it to give it a "haunted shipwreck" feel (I think zombies can drown for some reason, that would need to change). In general, having more places of interest, like the new villages, is certainly a good addition to the secondary features of the terrain generator. As the bigger issues are finalised, these later addons to the terrain will become more numerous and varied I hope.
0
"Refinement" would imply that the basic format for the equation remained the same, and the values of the variables were changed. That is NOT what happened. The fundemental mechanics behind how the resource was managed changed, from [food in = health increase] to [if food > X then periodic health increase].
The situation would be no different for skills. It is entirely possible, and even likely, that the mechanics we have become accustomed to will not be the default values or states for those abilities if a skill based system were implemented. The level of capability we have been accustomed to could be set as the values achieved when "maxed out."
That is still an optimistic assumption about the potential impact for a skill system, not a fact.
0
You presume too much. The new Hunger system changed the way food and health work very much. If skills were introduced there is no reason to think that the player characters' abilities to do such simple things as harvest raw materials could not change dramatically. To think it impossible or even unlikely would be naive.
0
You can't know that to be true. It is entirely possible that the mechanics we have become accustomed to will not be the default values or states for those abilities if a skill based system were implemented. The level of capability we have been accustomed to could be set as the values achieved when "maxed out."
0
While I don't think all arid terrain should be full of cacti, there are some arid regions that are very verdant.
That's why I would support breaking the current single Desert biome into three arid biomes, as I detail in a post on the second page of this thread. The Dunes biome is the classic cliche type of arid biome that would perhaps appeal more to you. I think it reasonable to split the arid and wetland biomes up more than they are currently to match the diversity of our arboreal biomes.
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For grassland or similar terrain under snow as well as the sand dunes type of arid biome, I think a fairly featureless landscape is expected. Having lived many years in the Great Plains, I can tell you the landscape looks quite flat and featureless under a foot of snow. The problem is really that there is only one type of arid biome, and only one redundant biome (Plains+snow=Snow biome) with snow.
I do agree that some biomes could use more secondary foliage or more varied surface geology. With an improved weather system, adding snow onto them would change their character significantly, and help increase the perception of more varied terrain types.
For a better Mountain biome, or an improved Snow biome, I think adding a layer of snow blocks would be a great addition. Not just the little layer of snow (although that could remain) but a nice layer of blocks, especially in the low areas like valleys and clefts of those terrain types.
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Would it be their lack of snow covered rocky peaks, not appealing to an epic "mountain feel"? Perhaps the new generic appearance lacking trees and always being grassy, which comes from all other biomes seemingly losing topographical variation? I know I have seen a thread or two regarding a dislike of the supposed increase in their fantastic/flying appearance. Is it that they simply aren't or can't be tall enough to achieve a proper mountain look or scale?
The torrent of redundant pre4 related threads seems to have buried this. There are still a lot of concerns being voiced about the terrain and map generation.
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Exactly. None of the functional mechanics have changed. It's just a matter of convenience as to where the thing is. I hope it stays.
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I personally don't think the current Mountain/"Extreme Hills" biome is at all mountainous in the stereotypical sense that most people expect when they think of "mountains." The expectation being extremely tall rugged rocky peaks, perhaps covered in snow or "so tall it's above the clouds," or so tall it has a tree-line. Part of that being because of the way the map is generated and the very limited Y axis not providing sufficient space for such things to exist.
As I've been forced to point out elsewhere, mountains in the general sense of tall geographical formations exist in every type of biome. Mountain is not a biome except in the extreme case of altitudes above which trees do not grow, otherwise they can be found hot or cold, wet or arid (Aird/Desert mts: one example the Great Basin Desert including the Grand Canyon, and much of the southwest US including the portions of the Rockies).
1
Awesome, now I have a use for all that Redstone. I can finally build with it instead of filling piles of double chests with powder I don't want.
It would be nice if the graphic didn't change to a pig (I assume its just the miniature, not the spawn effect changing). It has always seemed odd to have spawners exist but make them immutable - the only thing close to that was bedrock (and the new End portal) which actually had a reason to be that way. In that past Iv'e ignored them, because I didn't want to wander all over the place just to get to spawners, but if I can place them where I'd prefer once found, they're far more useful now.
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Riding dragons has become a cliche, and thus boring. I really hope Notch keeps his monsters as monsters.
I'd much rather have pigs grow wings and fly while being rideable than ever see dragon mounts in vanilla MC.
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^
Hopefully they will at least make the offspring random colors again. All white sheep herds are boring.